INDIANAPOLIS (WRTV) — Legal experts on Tuesday said the Supreme Court’s ruling on transgender athlete bans all but eliminates any federal challenges to Indiana’s law.
Indiana is one of 27 states with laws that prohibit transgender women and girls from competing on women’s or girls’ scholastic sports teams. Lawmakers passed a ban on transgender girls on K-12 sports teams in 2022 and expanded the ban to college sports teams last year. Both the NCAA and NAIA have policies banning transgender girls and women from girls’ and women’s sports teams in sports sanctioned by those organizations. On Tuesday, the United States Supreme Court ruled similar bans in Idaho and West Virginia do not violate the Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause or Title IX.
Steve Sanders, a professor at the IU Maurer School of Law who specializes in Constitutional law and laws involving LGBTQ+ issues, said although the ruling does not specifically address Indiana’s ban, the wording means every state ban on transgender athletes has been upheld.
“The only theoretical argument left would be that Indiana’s law somehow violates Indiana’s state constitution, or some guarantee within the state’s constitution. I’m not aware of anybody who has made that argument,” he said. “So, for all practical purposes, yes, I think this is the end of any potential challenge to Indiana’s law, at least based on federal statutes or federal constitutional law.”
Zoe Berne, senior directory of engagement and advocacy for Indiana Youth Group, said the court’s ruling effectively legalizes discrimination against transgender people. She said medical research does not show a consistent athletic advantage for transgender women and girls, especially those who began hormone replacement therapy before or in the early stages of puberty.
“I think that the timing is really interesting. Here we are on the last day of Pride Month, and we are just days away from the Fourth of July, Independence Day, this holiday that is supposed to celebrate the American ideals of freedom and liberty and pursuit of happiness, and we are once again denying this,” she said.
Writing for the court’s conservative majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh did not direct states that currently do not ban transgender athletes to do so.
“Consistent with Title IX and the Equal Protection Clause, we hold that the States may maintain women’s and girls’ sports for biological females. They may determine eligibility for women’s and girls’ sports based on biological sex. The Constitution and Title IX do not require an overhaul of women’s and girls’ sports throughout America.”
Sanders and Berne both said they expect the ruling will be used as the basis for future efforts to force a Supreme Court ruling to impose a nationwide ban. Jim Bopp, an Indiana lawyer active in a number of conservative cases, said he shares that view. He said he hopes that happens.
“The Supreme Court wouldn’t be forcing something; it would be the U.S. Constitution or current federal law. And the argument is that those protections apply to women and should protect them from men invading their private spaces, such as not only their sports but their locker rooms and bathrooms,” he said. “So it would be the Supreme Court recognizing those protections that are already in the law.”
Any such cases would still have to work their way through the lower courts. The Supreme Court’s term is now concluded, and the next one does not begin until October.
